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The Faceless Ones

Doctor Who serial

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 21, 2026
Entity authorityQ2892900 ↗
Source-derived summary

The Faceless Ones is the mostly missing eighth serial of the fourth season of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in six weekly parts from 8 April to 13 May 1967.

In this serial, the Second Doctor (Patrick Troughton) and his travelling companions Jamie (Frazer Hines), Ben (Michael Craze) and Polly (Anneke Wills) arrive at Gatwick Airport where identity-stealing aliens known as the Chameleons have taken refuge after their planet was destroyed, preying on university students by abducting them using the false holiday flight organisation 'Chameleon Tours'. It sees the departure of Craze and Wills as Ben and Polly. Only two of the six episodes are held in the BBC archives; four remain missing.

An animated version of the serial from BBC Studios was released on 16 March 2020. It became the eighth incomplete Doctor Who serial to receive full-length animated reconstructions of its missing episodes.

Plot

The TARDIS materialises on the runway of Gatwick Airport. The Doctor and his companions Ben, Polly and Jamie split up when a police officer appears. Polly ducks into the Chameleon Tours agency hangar and witnesses a murder by Spencer, who then reports back to his superior, Captain Blade. She returns to the hangar with the Doctor and Jamie to examine the body.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “The Faceless Ones” is doctor Who serial. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Faceless, Ones and Doctor, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA dependable orientation record for establishing vocabulary, names and a first evidence trail. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1967, 2020—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1967-04-08. For this dossier, Faceless, Ones and Doctor is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “doctor Who serial” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 21, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2892900. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1967 and 2020.

Critical limits

Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

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  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
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The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “The Faceless Ones”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow The Faceless Ones primary sources, The Faceless Ones archive and Faceless research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “The Faceless Ones”?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “The Faceless Ones” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.